At one time I was making my living repairing microwaves - and developing ever more interesting ways to check that output was up to scratch.
One experiment was to microwave a 1/4 x 1&1/4 glass fuse that had blown violently and metalised the inside of the glass tube.
That melted without starting it off with a blowtorch.
It was heated by hysteresis, which is the action by which a microwave works.
The was no electrical current in the glass.
IDIOTS!
Yeah, you retarded f*ck, because it had METAL in it!
In my first year at college the lecturer demonstrated a glass rod placed on a pair of metal trestles that were connected in series with a lightbulb, when heated red hot with a blowtorch the glass rod became conductive and the lightbulb lit.
Therefore you are the idiot.
That is a bit fast and likely to cause you trouble...steam or other solvent explosion is a real possibility if the sudden pressure increase cannot escape.
In that case you probably want to look at existing kit that includes the keywords electrothermal vapourisation and/or pyrolysis. It is a recognised analytical technique although emphasis is usually on a sequential controlled rate of temperature increase and plateaux of temperature to drive off first any water and then whatever organics and finally metals are to be analysed. Blatting things at 1000C immediately might not be so smart if they are even slightly damp with solvent.
Most of them seemed to use a graphitic carbon sample tube in an inert argon atmosphere and carrier gas. PSU has to be pretty chunky and the hefty current carrying cables flex amusingly when the thing is at top whack. There will be stuff in the patent literature for this.
Regards, Martin Brown
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